As part of the Growth and Opportunity Project’s effort, focus groups were conducted in Columbus, Ohio, and Des Moines, Iowa, to listen to voters who used to consider themselves Republicans. These are voters who recently left the Party.Asked to describe Republicans, they said that the Party is “scary,” “narrow minded,” and “out of touch” and that we were a Party of “stuffy old men.” This is consistent with the findings of other post-election surveys.Quote directly taken from the report

But wait

Instead of saying that Maybe ....MATBE we went a little teensy-weensy bit overboard on somepthin like say .... abortion?What does this reort say is something that the republicans should do to combat this image problem?

suggestions are likely to meet with some chuckles, such as one related to doing better with younger voters: “Establish an RNC Celebrity Task Force of personalities in the entertainment industry to host events for the RNC and allow donors to participate in entertainment events as a way to attract younger voters.”

The obvious plan is to keep the same image and just make the 'stuffy old man' votes count for more than the general population.See all the Republicans looking to make the electoral votes in their states determined by congressional district rather than by population.

RNC RHETORIC /ACTUAL POLICY“[W]e do need to make sure young people do not see the Party as totally intolerant of alternative points of view. Already, there is a generational difference within the conservative movement about issues involving the treatment and the rights of gays — and for many younger voters, these issues are a gateway into whether the Party is a place they want to be."/Republicans are spending millions of dollars defending the discriminatory Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), generally oppose federal nondiscrimination laws to protect the LGBT community and marriage equality.

“The Republican Party must be the champion of those who seek to climb the economic ladder of life. Low-income Americans are hard-working people who want to become hard-working middle-income Americans. Middle-income Americans want to become upper-middle-income, and so on. We need to help everyone make it in America.” /Rep. Paul Ryan’s (R-WI) budget, released last week, slashes the health and safety net programs that middle and lower income Americans rely on — like Medicare, Medicaid, and food stamps — while proposing tax code reforms that would significantly benefit top-income earners and corporations. A recent analysis from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities concluded that the budget “would get at least 66 percent of its $5 trillion in non-defense budget cuts over ten years (relative to a continuation of current policies) from programs that serve people of limited means.” GOP governors have offered plans to axe state corporate and personal income taxes, replacing them instead with an increase in the sales tax. Such policies would directly benefit the rich at the expense of the poor.

“We have to blow the whistle at corporate malfeasance and attack corporate welfare. We should speak out when a company liquidates itself and its executives receive bonuses but rank-and-file workers are left unemployed. We should speak out when CEOs receive tens of millions of dollars in retirement packages but middle-class workers have not hada meaningful raise in years.” /Republicans have proposed slashing the corporate tax rate just as corporate profits are skyrocketing and wages for middle and lower income Americans remain stagnant. The GOP seeks to repeal Wall Street reform and resists any efforts to tax capital gains at a higher rate, close the carried interest loophole, or raise any taxes on higher-income earners. Rep. Paul Ryan’s (R-WI) budget, for instance, “would result in tax cuts worth an average of about $330,000 a year to households with incomes of more than $1 million a year.”

“Our candidates, spokespeople, and staff need to use language that addresses concerns that are on women’s minds in order to let them know we are fighting for them.“ /Republicans in Congress oppose provisions in the Affordable Care Act that provide contraception coverage to women without additional co-pays, have backed measures to allow employers to deny birth control to their female employees, voted against equal pay for equal work, and even stonewalled the Violence Against Women Act. Lawmakers on the state level have enacted numerous provisions that seek to severly restrict access to abortion services.

Macaque saidThe obvious plan is to keep the same image and just make the 'stuffy old man' votes count for more than the general population.See all the Republicans looking to make the electoral votes in their states determined by congressional district rather than by population.

This is deplorable, but the good news is that their hard core basis is literally dieing.

GQjock saidsuggestions are likely to meet with some chuckles, such as one related to doing better with younger voters: “Establish an RNC Celebrity Task Force of personalities in the entertainment industry to host events for the RNC and allow donors to participate in entertainment events as a way to attract younger voters.”

Oh I get it. The problem is not that their party platform endorses a position of denying freedom and equality to gay Americans. The problem is not that they endorse adopting a Constitutional amendment to make same-gender couples second-class citizens. The problem is not that this policy of hate and discrimination is now rejected by a majority of Americans and by a supermajority of young Americans who find it disgusting.

No, the problem is they haven't asked celebrities to help sell their homophobia.